The Midwife of St. Petersburg

by Linda Lee Chaikin

  Her head jerked up. “No, Uncle.”

  Matvey struck a match and absently lit his pipe. He could understand why she wished to avoid Kronstadt at the station; arriving on the heels of yet another political assassination could go badly for her. He let the matter pass for the present.

  “We hope Leonovich’s death will be blamed on a robbery along the road,” Karena said. “The best thing would be if his body isn’t discovered at all. We planned to contact you secretly and explain to the family. Natalia, of course, was the biggest worry in that regard, and Sergei.”

  “My dear, things don’t work so simply in life. I think you know that. If the authorities wish to convict you both of murder, they will. We’ll need to help one another, and by that I mean we Jews and those who befriend us. First, there is someone I must see. Please trust me in this.”

  “I trust your judgment, Uncle, but—you’re not going to Colonel Kronstadt?”

  Dismay covered her face, and he laid a steadying hand on her shoulder. “No, not yet.”

  “Not yet?”

  “There’s someone visiting in town, a lawyer friend from Finland. I’ve known him for several years. His knowledge is most valuable.”

  “We can trust him?”

  “Yes, we can. Others have.” He was thinking of those his friend had helped across the Finnish border into safety, yet he did not wish to alarm her now with the possibility that they must flee Russia. “After I’ve talked with him and others,” he said gently, “we’ll discuss matters.” If escape were necessary, it would be wiser to move with as little disturbance as possible. Agents of Durnov may be watching the Roskov residence, and they may even have this apartment under surveillance. Yeva’s illness made matters worse. It would be difficult for her to travel, especially across the border.

  Matvey tried to conceal his fear from Karena. There was only one man in the Okhrana who might aid them. If Kronstadt did have a developing interest in her, he could be trusted.

  Matvey made up his mind. He could only hide them for a short time. Karena was against contacting Kronstadt, but he must use his own judgment.

  He thought of his Messianic studies. Many of his Jewish friends would be appalled to discover that he had become a believer in Jesus the Messiah. In his heart, he turned to his Savior and Redeemer for divine wisdom. For their sakes, he prayed, may they, too, come to put their faith in Jesus, the Messiah.

  “We will make no further decisions just yet,” he told Karena. “You need food and rest, just as Yeva does. While you see to that, I’ll be going out. I need to make a few calls. I will return this evening. If I’m not back by supper, there are eggs and more cheese in the icebox and bread on the pantry shelf.”

  She followed him into the hall. He opened the bedroom door, and they stood looking at Madame Yeva. Matvey’s anger was roused, as he understood the reason for the bruises on his sister’s throat and the cuts and swelling on Karena. Lord, I entrust this to you. There are so many trials in life that just can’t be solved until your reign. Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven!

  Karena walked quickly to the bed. “Her brow is damp,” she whispered to him. “She’s flushed. Her breathing is heavy and troubled.”

  She came back out of the small bedroom and closed the door behind her. “Uncle, I don’t think I should wait any longer to find a doctor.”

  He nodded. But now that he knew the truth, he was no longer comfortable with calling the doctor he’d first had in mind. The man might be trustworthy, but caution must prevail.

  “She does need medical care,” he said. “I thought so the moment I saw her. You’ve nothing, Karena, in her medical bag?”

  “We brought little besides birthing supplies and some headache tonic. If I had mother’s quinine tablets … But I’ve already looked, and she hasn’t any. She either ran out or overlooked bringing them. But I am thinking of a woman she knows here in St. Petersburg. She knew her years ago at the medical college. She’s a doctor now—Dr. Lenski.”

  The name jolted him. “Lenski’s mother? It would be a mistake to bring her here. If the apartment is being watched, the Okhrana will move in the moment they recognize her.”

  “But they know where she is. She works freely out of the college—she and her daughter, Ivanna. If the Okhrana wanted to arrest them, they could have by now. Uncle, please. I’m sure it’s safe. I will call on her myself. There are several matters I need to discuss with her.”

  “Then I’ll leave the doctor business to you, and I’ll make arrangements in town to see my lawyer friend. I should be back in time for supper.” From a drawer he removed a spare key and handed it to her.

  “Better get something to eat and rest an hour. Matters will work out, Karena. We need to believe that there are greater purposes at work in the world and in our lives than most people acknowledge. We ignore those purposes to our peril.”

  He saw a responsive flicker in her blue eyes and the beginning of a smile that tried to encourage him of her trust. He thought she might be close to believing in the Messiah. He patted her head, thinking of her as the little girl in braids he remembered from years ago.

  “I wouldn’t assume too quickly that Colonel Kronstadt should be feared.”

  Karena watched Uncle Matvey leave through the front door of the apartment. She stood for a moment, considering his suggestion, and then went into the kitchen to find food for her mother.

  She found a piece of cooked lamb and set about to make a broth. While the meat simmered, she wet some hand towels, cooled them in the icebox for a few minutes, and with a small bowl of water, went to attend her mother’s fever.

  Her mother’s eyes fluttered open. Karena watched her with concern. Yeva tried to reach for Karena’s hand.

  Karena leaned closer, laying the cool cloth on her forehead. “Mother, you’re burning up with fever. A few days more like this, and you will waste away to nothing. There’s no choice but to go for a doctor. I’m going to try to get Dr. Lenski to prescribe medication. Or perhaps even Dr. Zinnovy. I never told you this, but he was kind to me at Kiev and—”

  Her mother’s face turned rigid with protest. The reaction was so harsh that it surprised Karena.

  “No,” Yeva whispered in a croaky voice. Her head fell back against the damp pillow with exhaustion, and her breath rattled in her lungs. She felt her mother’s fingers tighten on her hand.

  “Dr. Zinnovy may not be able to come, Mother. But if he does, I am most confident he can be trusted now. He protected me from the police after Grinevich was attacked. He was there at the meeting too. I saw him.”

  Karena does not understand. She thinks I don’t want Dmitri here because I fear he’ll go to the police. Poor Karena, my poor little girl. She will never know he’s her father, and I cannot tell her.

  “I must do something or I’ll lose you, Mother. I don’t want to lose you—”

  Don’t want to lose you. Those words came journeying back from the past in the emotional voice of Dmitri. Yeva had not seen him in years, and she did not want to see him now. The old ember of resentment burst into raw fire again. She looked up into Karena’s face, young yet wise beyond her years—wiser than she herself had been at that age when she’d met the handsome Dr. Dmitri Zinnovy. She closed her eyes again. She was tired—so very tired—as her mind turned and began walking backward in time to when she was pregnant with her child and his …

  Yeva had fled the Imperial College of Medicine and Midwifery, devastated with her predicament and Dmitri’s response to the news. With tears in her eyes and a heart squeezed with pain, she packed her bags in a rush. The door opened quickly, and footsteps sounded behind her. She whirled defensively. It was not Dmitri, but her colleague and friend, Fayina Lenski, in her second year of medical studies.

  “Yeva, you cannot go away.”

  “But, Fayina, I must. You know the regulations.” Any woman pregnant out of wedlock was dismissed. That was not the only reason she was leaving; she was running from Dmitri and his
heartless betrayal. He had recommended an abortion.

  “I know this hurts and shocks you, Yeva, but it is an answer that will safeguard us both,” he had told her.

  “Safeguard,” she had cried as they met secretly and walked through the falling snow down Tverskoy Boulevard. It was ten o’clock at night, and the telega was parked a block behind where they’d gotten out to talk.

  “Yes, we must safeguard your life and opportunity to go on with your medical studies, even as my position as head instructor must be guarded. I cannot leave the countess, divorce, and remarry. I’ve always said that.”

  Countess Katya Zinnovy of the great Rezanov family. Yeva realized she’d been a fool. Dmitri would never leave the countess, though he’d told Yeva he did not love Katya and that Katya had an incurable disease of the kidneys that would take her life within a year. Then, she and Dmitri would marry. There had been reasons to become Dmitri’s mistress—all the wrong and selfish reasons that had seemed entirely logical and practical. She had compromised so much in the name of “love.”

  She turned from Dmitri and hurried back toward the telega.

  In the medical dormitory, Fayina walked up beside her bunk. “Where will you go? What will you do, Yeva?”

  “I cannot go home to Warsaw.” There’d been a recent pogrom there, but she did not want to mention it. “There is an area of St. Petersburg where I can find an affordable room. I shall work among the poor peasant women. They will pay in food and commodities. I’ll not destroy my baby, no matter what.”

  “You can stay with me. I have room. And if it’s work you are worried about, I know a doctor who can use you in deliveries. He works with peasants, prostitutes, and Gypsies.”

  Yeva had been indebted to Fayina Lenski from that day forward. She’d moved to her inexpensive flat and was there only a week when Dr. Zinnovy unexpectedly arrived.

  “Who told you I was here?”

  “Fayina.”

  She felt betrayed, but Dmitri said he had elicited Yeva’s whereabouts by threatening her medical studies.

  “I am desperate. Forgive me, Yeva. Forgive me. No, wait. Please, let me talk.”

  And talk he did, pleading with her that, if she must keep their baby, she should marry to spare herself and the baby from shame. He knew the perfect man, desperate for an arranged marriage with a wise woman. He was a gentile, but one who looked upon the seed of Jacob with favor. He was a schoolmaster and a farmer, and his family had been favored by Czar Alexander I. His wife had died, and he had a small boy named Sergei. If she would accept this marriage to Josef Peshkov, whom he knew to be a kind and decent man, Dmitri would see to everything. He then produced a bag of silver coins to tide her over. He would make sure she had a dowry in order to enter the Peshkov family with respect. And when the child became a young adult, he would pay for the education.

  Madame Yeva was staring up at Karena’s lovely face, not seeing the bruises, but the past—her own struggle for love, meaning, and purpose in life. She had thought she had found it in Dr. Zinnovy, and for years afterward, she had grieved for him late at night while Josef slept beside her. Tears filled Yeva’s eyes. Now it was Josef she missed, longed for, and had so many regrets about. Josef was not the handsome man Dmitri had been, but his character made him a giant among men. She missed him and worried about his health and whether he was getting enough food.

  “Josef, Josef, if only you were here.”

  “Mother.” Karena bent her head and rested it a moment on her bosom. Yeva smoothed the damp hair from Karena’s neck as they cried together.

  I do not regret having borne you, my dearest one. I thank God I did not get rid of you as they’d suggested—how precious you are.

  Karena raised her head. Her mother’s eyes flickered open again, tried to focus, and then closed. “Not Zinnovy. Lenski … Dr. Fayina Lenski … at the college now … go there to her …” Yeva gave a shuddering breath that sent a dart of fear through Karena. She stood, clasping her slim fingers and gazing down at her mother.

  She recalled her mother’s alarm when she mentioned writing to Dr. Lenski about her admission to the medical school. It was a relief to see she knew she was in need of help, but why not Dr. Zinnovy?

  Karena left the bedroom and looked back at her sleeping mother before closing the door. She stood there for a moment, thinking. She’d better understand what she was getting into. Dr. Lenski would ask about their bruises, as well as treat her mother’s illness. She would want to know what they were doing here in St. Petersburg with Yeva’s brother.

  There would be no need to explain everything. Karena went to the kitchen and set the broth aside on the back of the stove.

  She could explain their stay here with Uncle Matvey with little difficulty, but other questions could lead to problems, as he had warned.

  She made up her mind. She had to trust her mother’s old college roommate.

  She slipped into her fur coat and went to Matvey’s desk to write a note in case he returned before she did. As she was about to turn for the front door, her eyes caught sight of his Bible sitting open on his desk. While she pulled on her gloves, she leaned over and glanced at the page. Some of the words were underlined, and there were notes written along the margins. It was the book of the prophet Isaiah, chapter 53. “He (God) shall see the labor of His (Messiah’s) soul, and be satisfied.” In the margin Uncle had written: “The Suffering Messiah: Jesus on the cross.” On a sheet of paper he’d written: “This prophecy of the promised Messiah is fulfilled, as is most of chapter 53. The sin debt is fully paid. We now have redemption through our true Passover Lamb, the Lord Jesus Christ.”

  Karena’s tired mind responded in simple trust and faith. Her eyes moistened. Yes, I believe it. Jesus is my Passover Lamb. God, forgive me for what happened to Leonovich.

  She left the apartment using her key. Her feet were still weary, her mind tired, and her earthly problems remained. But a peace calmed her troubled heart with an assurance that she now possessed peace with the Holy God.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  A Door Opens

  The first sight of the college Karena had dreamed of attending brought a smile of excitement. It was a four-story palace with a pale yellow, colonnaded front and rectangular windows trimmed in tones of pink and blue. The front of the building gazed out on what in the summer would be a grassy square surrounded by flowering shrubs and trees, but now the square was a carpet of white.

  She glanced about in wonder. The topaz and gold-veined marble floors and walls were magnificent, lending dignity to those who studied and worked to serve the needs of the suffering.

  In her research to learn how the palace had become a part of the medical school, she’d learned that Countess Irina Vasiliy, upon her death in 1907, had awarded the palace for the use of the college, years after Yeva and Fayina attended as students. The Lying-In Charity Hospital and midwife program, however, was a private enterprise begun by Dr. Zinnovy and now headed by Dr. Lenski.

  She walked up the steps, entered a three-story rotunda, and climbed the great stairway to the second floor where the doctors’ and administrative offices were located. Karena was shown to Dr. Fayina Lenski’s comfortable office with a window that overlooked the Neva River. Karena’s excitement died when her eyes fell upon the somber Peter and Paul prison fortress. Papa’s in there, she thought, sickened. She was in earnest prayer for him when she heard voices, and a door opened. Karena turned away from the window.

  Two women entered, one of them carrying a stethoscope and standing several inches taller than the younger, who had auburn hair and pleasantly attractive features. That must be Ivanna, Karena decided.

  Her guess was correct. The young woman introduced herself as Ivanna and then turned to the older doctor. “This is Dr. Lenski.”

  Ivanna’s face was stoic, as though she did not know who Karena was. But she had her name and must know she was Sergei’s sister. Karena wondered how Ivanna had managed to escape Kiev. Did she know where her brother Petrov was hidi
ng? Had the Okhrana interrogated her yet?

  Dr. Lenski looked Karena over. “So you’re Yeva’s daughter. Yes, the resemblance is there. Dr. Zinnovy mentioned you are interested in medical studies.” Fayina Lenski’s curly auburn hair showed from beneath her cap.

  Ivanna turned to her mother. “I’d better get back with the patient. Nice meeting you, Miss Peshkova,” she said and left the room.

  Karena found herself under scrutiny. “You should be putting salve on those bruises. Were you in an accident?”

  Karena had rehearsed what she would say to the inevitable inquiry. “Yes, a minor fall is all. I shall be fine in a few weeks. I did not come for myself but for Madame Yeva Peshkova.” Karena hurriedly explained that her mother was very ill and urgently needed help, and would Dr. Lenski be so kind as to come with Karena to the Sergievsky district where they were staying with her uncle?

  “Yeva asked for me, did she?”

  “She speaks highly of you, Dr. Lenski. Some of my earliest memories when following her around in her work as a nurse and midwife in Kiev are frequent mentions of your name. I’d fully expected—hoped—to attend the college this past September. Alas, I was turned down for—for overcrowding.” That was hardly the reason, but Dr. Lenski would probably know that.

  “Yes, overcrowding. An unfortunate situation. I keep hoping matters will improve. Unfortunately, I have nothing to do with admittance. I’d have helped you get in, if for no other reason than Yeva. Dr. Zinnovy wrote in his memo that your grades are excellent. Perhaps we will be able to do something.”

  Karena brightened, though she knew the lack of funds would thwart her even if an opening were found for her.

  “What specialty did you plan to pursue?”

  “Midwifery and nursing. The thought of becoming a medical doctor is hardly conceivable. I’ve been waiting for three years just to enter the midwife course. I’ve already helped with deliveries in Kiev. I delivered my first baby alone in August.” She did not dare say who the baby’s father was, since Ivanna was seeing Sergei. Did the doctor even know about her daughter and Sergei? or that Ivanna had accompanied Petrov to Kiev? Somehow she didn’t think so. In any event, she would heartily disapprove.